Gameplay: Stealth
One of the most valuable skills in the Equestrian Wasteland is often that of going unnoticed. Stealth is always an opposed check between the Sneak skill of the character attempting to go unnoticed and the of the potential observer. As with any check where a skill is opposed by a , the character using the skill rounds up for determining degrees of success. Both the character’s Sneak roll and the potential observer’s Perception check may be (and often are) modified due to situation and conditions. As with combat, these modifiers are capable of exceeding the +/- 30% modifiers to Skill checks. Likewise, modifiers to Perception checks for spotting characters attempting stealth may exceed the normal +/- 3 limit. Some bonuses may increase a Sneak or Perception score above the normal cap (usually 100 for Sneak and 10 for Perception); those bonuses which may break the normal maximum are always added last. Modifiers Environmental Modifiers While the Sneak skill covers moving quietly, keeping to shadows, using cover and other aspects of stealth, a character’s Sneak check may be modified by environmental conditions that are conducive or adverse to stealth attempts. These bonuses or penalties are only applied to a roll where the environment impacts the primary sense that the potential observer would use to notice the character. Environmental bonuses or penalties cannot exceed the +/- 30 limit, and cannot raise a skill beyond its normal maximum. However, stealth perks such as Ghost or Death From Above grant special bonuses that may exceed this limit and can raise the character’s effective Sneak beyond the normal maximum. Example: Sweet Tooth is attempting to sneak by a zombie pony (feral ghoul) in a narrow, darkened tunnel. The zombie pony would be using sight as its primary sense, so Sweet Tooth gains a +20 bonus to her Sneak check. Since Sweet Tooth has the Ghost perk, this becomes a +40 bonus, the latter +20 of which (from Ghost) can raise her Sneak above its maximum. If Sweet Tooth was attempting to sneak by a bloodwing (who would detect by echolocation) or a Steel Ranger (who would detect by the arcane detection magic of her E.F.S.), then Sweet Tooth would gain no environmental bonus for the darkness. Range Modifiers Perception checks against sneaking characters are most commonly modified due to range or number of potential observers. *When a potential observer relying primarily on sight is approached from behind, this is reduced to the Point Blank bonus. Multiple Observers When a Sneak check is being opposed by a group of potential observers, the potential observer with the highest makes the roll. Identically stated groups of creatures gain a +2 variance bonus to Perception checks to simulate a degree of variety amongst the individual creatures’ perceptiveness. This bonus cannot raise the creatures’ effective perception above 10. The potential observer in a group gains a +1 bonus to the roll for each additional member of the group, to a maximum of +5. This bonus may increase the potential observer’s Perception above 10. Larger groups should be divided, making separate rolls. '' Example: Now, Sweet Tooth is attempting to sneak by a group of eight zombie ponies in the same darkened, narrow tunnel. The zombie ponies are generically stated with a Perception of 4. The GM rules that they are all milling about in a general throng, so divides the zombie ponies into one group of six and one group of two. The zombie ponies get two checks to spot Sweet Tooth. The first check is for the group of six, and is rolling using an effective Perception of 4 + 2 (variance) +1 (point blank due to narrow tunnel) +5 (group), for an effective Perception of 12. The second group only gets a +1 bonus for group size, for an effective Perception of 8. Fortunately for Sweet Tooth, she has the Ghost perk and her Special Talent is related to stealth, giving her a maximum Sneak of 115. Sweet Tooth’s current Sneak skill is at 100, so for this roll her effective her Sneak is 100 +15 (Darkness, maxing at 115) +20 (Ghost), for an effective Sneak of 135.'' Category:Gameplay